


Won't Stop

by cheekiestcheeky



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: And More Fluff, Did I mention fluff?, Fluff, M/M, Sappy, Tattoos, sweet disposition
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-08
Updated: 2013-06-08
Packaged: 2017-12-14 08:16:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/834690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cheekiestcheeky/pseuds/cheekiestcheeky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis sings the wrong lyrics to Sweet Disposition, and Harry doesn't let it go. Actually, he'll never let it go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Won't Stop

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bitmischievous](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bitmischievous/gifts).



> Happy birthday to the ever-wonderful, [bitmischievous](http://archiveofourown.org/users/bitmischievous)!! I wrote you a thing, Jase, I hope you like it (and let me tell you, this would have been a hell of a lot easier to finish iF YOU HADN'T DRAGGED ME INTO AN ANALYTICAL DISCUSSION OF THE SWEET DISPOSITION LYRICS LAST NIGHT WHILE I WAS WRITING S2G.) 
> 
> Also, basically just turn on Sweet Disposition by The Temper Trap and stick it on repeat. Enjoy :)

“You’re _still_ playing that song?”

Louis laughs, coming into the room just far enough to lean against the doorframe. He crosses his arms against his chest, raising an expectant brow. “Sweet Disposition, huh?”

Harry looks up from his laptop for a short moment but glances away with a shrug. “It’s a good song,” he mumbles, a blush dusting along his cheeks. 

“It’s alright, yeah,” Louis agrees, shoving off the doorframe to fully enter the room. “But it’s not _that_ good, is it? I mean you can’t even understand half of what he’s saying.” He pauses, lets another two lines go by. “Yeah, scratch that, you can’t make out like 88% of what this guy is saying.” 

The younger boy snorts, green eyes distracted from his computer, running down tan skin instead. He ends up falling into two pools of blue, a light smile pulling back just the corner of his lips. “88%? That’s oddly specific, Lou.” 

“Yeah, well.” Louis shrugs. “Someone needs to be specific. Lord knows this guy isn’t.” 

“Hey,” Harry says, drawing out the word with a taste of offense. 

“Hey what, it’s not like he’s in the room, Harold,” Louis laughs, chuckling as the song carries on beneath him. “You don’t have to defend him.”

“I know, but.” Harry shrugs again, eyes momentarily dropping back to his computer. “It’s like my favorite song right now, alright, so don’t like…” He trails off, waving a hand. He smiles, lopsidedly, and looks back to Louis. “It kind of means something to me, okay?” 

A laugh dies in Louis’ throat, never reaching the room, and rather than belittling Harry anymore he wonders, “Why’s it so important?” 

“Oh.” Harry shrugs, and blue eyes and tan skin are suddenly all he sees, just a blur of sky blue and sunkissed skin and he has to blink four times just to see straight. The song ends, but it’s on repeat so it loops right back around, and Harry lets it play through a line before clearing his throat. He shrugs once again, forcing his eyes onto his screen. “Reminds me of someone,” he says, words low and shoved together. 

“What was that?” Louis asks, leaning down a bit over Harry’s laptop to hear. 

Harry sighs, mumbles, “Reminds me of you,” and dares a glance upward. He finds the older boy staring at him in a moment of complete motionless, features a bit slack, blue eyes holding a note of blankness. But then it’s like the words register, and Louis’ features turn up; his thin lips quirk into a grin and his eyes come to life with a glimmer of something bright and happy. Harry might compare it to living art, watching the older boy’s features twitch with subtle changes of emotion, but he’s too distracted to think so when Louis slams the lid of his laptop and causes the music to cut off in one abrupt second, leaving the room hanging in silence. 

“Why do you need a silly song for reminding,” Louis starts, hands flat on the laptop as he leans in and down, coming level with Harry’s gaze, “when I’m right here?” 

_Good question_ , the reply burns on Harry’s tongue. What he ends up saying, after a dry swallow, eyes seemingly glued to a spot just above Louis’ lips, is, “The song wasn’t… The song isn’t over.” 

“Won’t stop till it’s over,” Louis sings in lieu of a proper response, the lyric teasing a smile onto his lips. 

He moves the laptop from Harry’s lap, sets it on the table, and Harry watches with a bewildered gaze. “Thought you didn’t know the lyrics,” he says, swallowing past another lump when Louis turns that half-smile, half-smirk toward him. They’re new to this still, this _just past friendly_ side of their relationship, and Harry’s palms still get sweaty when Louis looks at him like _that_ or when he can feel the heat radiating from the older boy because he’s so _close_. 

He can feel Louis’ exhales against his skin and it makes his body twitch, his heart doing something like racing. _Are those butterflies?_ he wonders just as Louis leans in even closer, close enough that he feels like he’s invading Louis’ privacy, watching those blue eyes rake up and down and settle low. 

His stomach lurches when Louis’ smile curls back into a smirk. When Louis continues, his words are soft on a whisper and his smirk wrinkles the skin beside his eyes. “Won’t stop till we surrender,” he says, kind of hums it like a song, and he follows it with a breathy sort of laugh, inching forward. 

But, “Those aren’t the right lyrics,” Harry blurts out, because he loves ruining the moment. 

Louis pauses, blinks once like maybe he heard wrong. Harry expects him to back away then, maybe argue because Louis never admits to being wrong. But all the older boy does is laugh out, “Shut it, you tosser,” before leaning in the rest of the way and stealing away any more words Harry might have thought to let loose. 

And, _alright_ , Harry thinks, pressing into the kiss; he can let Louis’ misheard lyrics slide for now. 

**

“Aren’t there any other songs in your mental song bank?” Louis asks over the shower spray, voice raised to be heard. 

Harry pulls back the shower curtain just far enough to stick his head out. His wet curls are plastered haphazardly across his forehead and he grins, wide and cheeky, at Louis. “Like no one’s watching youuuu,” he sings, drawing out the words just like the song. 

“But I’m watching you,” Louis points out once Harry’s ducked back behind the curtain again. His lips might curl into a smile that he tries his damnedest to resist, but Harry can’t see that. He schools his features back into indifference and hops up onto the counter space beside the sink. “I’m watching you, Harry, I’m listening to you, and I’m not being funny but how many times can you play and sing that song before you get sick of it?” 

“Don’t know,” Harry answers after a beat of silence. Louis imagines the younger boy shrugging under the spray of water, probably smiling to himself when he says, “Might tire of it tomorrow, or next week, or next year, or I might still be blasting it in a nursing home. What do you think?” 

“I think you’re bloody obsessed with a stupid song, mate, that’s what I think.” 

“A moment, a love, a dream, a laugh, a kiss, a _cryyy_ ,” Harry sings and then falls off into a bout of fake sobbing. 

The older boy heaves a sigh, rolling his eyes. “Least you’ve stopped singing,” he notes in return, a teasing note running through his words. 

Harry whips the shower curtain back, his entire sudsy torso on display and a harsh contrast to the glare that’s knitted along his brow. “Our rights,” he continues and grits out, wagging a finger toward Louis, “ _our wrongs_.”

“So I’m a wrong now?” Louis asks, hopping off the counter. 

The younger boy’s lips trick upward with a smile. “No, you’re a right,” he says. “You’re just a right who has a lot of wrongs.” 

“That so?” Louis laughs, shrugging out of his shirt and shimmying out of his boxer shorts. 

Harry shrugs, one soapy shoulder rising and falling as he watches Louis’ movements with a curious eye. “Wrong about the song being stupid,” he explains, his voice a bit distant, eyes distracted. “Wrong about the lyrics, too.” 

Louis groans and pushes Harry back just enough to step into the shower beside him. He pulls the curtain shut behind him and frowns. “You’re still going on about me getting the lyrics wrong?” He pushes Harry under the spray with a hand to his chest, but laughter bubbles out of them both. “That was _one_ time.” 

“All it takes is one time.” Harry shrugs again, smiles an awful smirk, and tugs Louis under the spray to join him. The older boy doesn’t put up a fight, not even a little. 

But, “It wasn’t even a huge mistake,” Louis does whine after a moment, frowning once more. “I messed up like two words. Big deal.” 

“Yeah, but, you say you’ve heard the song enough,” Harry points out, running his fingers down Louis’ side. “You should know the words by now, shouldn’t you?” 

A handful of seconds pass, Louis more fascinated in tracing the muscles that are becoming more and more defined all along Harry’s stomach rather than filling the void with an answer. He speaks after a minute though, leading it with a shrug, “Doesn’t matter, really. My version’s better.” 

Harry lets out a laugh, a hearty, rough sound that echoes in the stall, and can’t stop himself from pushing away a bit of Louis’ damp fringe that’s hanging over his eyes. “How do you reason that?” he asks when Louis looks to him, and he falters for a moment because he’s still not used to this – Louis looking at him like he’s something special. 

And maybe he was expecting an actual answer right then, but maybe he should have known better under the circumstances. Because Louis just grins at him, eyes alight while one hand slides down between them and takes full advantage of the opportunity. “My version of everything is better, isn’t it?” he asks on a breath, and Harry loses hold of his response as Louis runs a thumb across the head of his cock. 

And _yeah, yeah, definitely better_ he would agree in that moment and would yell aloud to the world if he were ever asked, but the words stick to his tongue and get pressed against the inside of Louis’ cheeks and all along his lips. 

But he manages to get out sometime later, back pressed against the shower tiles, chest rising and falling too quickly, “Wait, wait, wait.” 

“What?” Louis asks against neck. 

“Will you tell me, sometime?” Harry wonders, holding onto the thought even as Louis keeps tending to the same spot just above his collarbone. 

Louis pauses, whining against Harry’s skin. “Tell you _what_?” 

Harry laughs, a breathy sound this time. “Tell me why your version is better,” he reiterates, meets Louis’ gaze once the older boy lifts his head. “I, erm. I’d like to know.” 

A line creases Louis’ brow at first, like he’s not following, but then he seems to understand. “Oh, oh, the song.” He nods, and then shakes his head, smiles fondly. “Yeah, sure, fine, sometime. Not this time, though, alright, we’re kinda busy, yeah?” 

“Yeah, yeah, right, busy, yeah,” Harry agrees, nodding too eagerly. They don’t waste another second before their lips join again, skin sliding against skin, and the water has long since run cold, but neither seems to notice. 

**

Sometime comes sooner than Harry thought it would. 

Harry thought that maybe he’d be able to weasel it out of Louis several weeks down the road, after much persistent bugging and nagging and reminding. But he tells Harry about his version just a few weeks later, gentle words shared in a tumbled mess of sheets and soft lips, fingers drawing against bare skin in the daze of an early morning. 

“It _was_ just misheard lyrics at first,” Louis starts out telling him, winding down. He pulls his eyes from the ceiling, quite a feat, and stares at Harry with a smile that’s struck silly. 

“Yeah?” Harry asks, mind still too blurred for him to ask much else. He looks right back at Louis though, green falling into blue in a slash of sunlight that curls through the blinds. He likes the way it makes Louis’ skin seem to glow, but he never says those sorts of thoughts aloud, so he tucks the sentiment into a warm smile instead. 

Louis seems to return it and rolls onto his side, propping up on an elbow. “Yeah,” he continues, seeming to smile at a memory. “And then you started to play the song all the god damn time and, like, I caught on to the lyrics, of course. I’d have to be deaf not to have at some point, with how often you go around singing it, too. But.” 

“But,” Harry repeats, grinning a little too stupidly wide for the moment; Louis doesn’t comment on it. 

“But I liked my misheard lyrics more than the actual ones, I guess,” Louis explains. His eyes drop to the mattress after a moment, and though a smile still clings to his lips he shrugs a shoulder like _maybe it’s stupid, I don’t know._

Harry lets a beat of silence pass, one that seems to drag on in lazy twists and turns as he waits for Louis to continue. He doesn’t, though, so the younger boy reaches up, the back of a knuckle brushing against the scruff shadowing Louis’ jaw. Blue eyes jump at the touch but fall again quickly, rather than catching on green. 

“Why?” Harry wonders, keeping his voice a whisper. He doesn’t draw his hand away, lets the contact hold in the minutes that follow. “What’s the difference?” 

Louis shrugs again. His lips are curved into a small smile, but he keeps his eyes downcast the whole time. “Not much, I guess,” he admits, throwing it out there like a safety net, one to maybe keep him from sounding too silly. “I just feel like the actual lyrics are just kind of, I don’t know… defiant? Too bold and cliché. Like, yeah, we won’t stop to give up, which is good and all, but that’s all they’re saying. They won’t stop just to surrender, right, but that doesn’t mean they won’t stop at all, you know? But, won’t stop till we surrender, that’s different. That’s like, _we won’t stop until we give it our all_ , like we might end sometime, because everything does eventually, but we won’t end it until we try our hardest to avoid it, and that’s—” he breaks off then, a sharp cut of silence, and frowns, sparing Harry a quick glance. “Never mind,” he shakes his head, voice dropping again with his eyes, “that sounds really, really dumb, actually, doesn’t it?” 

The older boy lets out a heavy sigh and falls back onto the mattress. “Forget it,” he mumbles under a breath. 

Harry thinks about letting him, thinks about rolling out of bed to start the day, but he doesn’t. He lets the silence stretch on for several moments, lets Louis roll onto his back and blink up at the ceiling, lets Louis fight off the blush that always accompanies him when he speaks in that honest voice of his—that one that he keeps secret most of the time, reserves for the special opportunity in a small group or one-on-one, kept for rare instances of privacy when he bares his heart and lets down his guard. The quiet moments like this one, when he doesn’t have to put on his façade and laugh too loudly and talk in grand voices as a misdirection. 

But a blush always follows that softer voice, and Harry reaches out after another minute. He smudges away the last traces of the darkened skin, brushing at it with the pad of his thumb like it’s nothing more than a splatter of paint. “I like that,” he murmurs, just loud enough to be heard, words falling like feathers. Louis looks to him then, seemingly lost, and Harry clarifies, “Your version. I like it, too.” 

The smallest of smiles graces Louis’ lips, gliding across them with an ease only ever seen in the morning. “You do?” he wonders, still deeming it one of those quiet moments. 

Harry lets his own lips kick upward with a grin, and he perches his chin on the older boy’s chest before nodding. “Actually, yeah.” He waits a moment, grinning down at Louis, and adds, “We should sing it your way.”

“Should we?” Louis asks, and yeah, there it is, that swift little change, the gentle tones gone and replaced by teasing ones, a joke hiding away in the corner of his lips. Harry watches as the quiet moment ends, but he doesn’t miss the way Louis leaves a touch too tender just at the bottom of his spine. 

“We should, yes,” Harry agrees and pushes himself farther up over the older boy, nearly covering him up limb for limb. 

Louis shifts under Harry’s weight but huffs out a laugh. “Alright then,” he says, eyes coated with a grin. “Even though they’re the wrong lyrics.” 

“Yeah, but.” Harry shrugs a shoulder, smile turning lopsided. “They’re your wrong lyrics, so I guess that makes them alright.” 

Louis snorts, hard enough that his features scrunch up, and Harry definitely doesn’t find it endearing. 

“You’re such a dork,” the older boy mutters, but Harry doesn’t think he really means any harm by it—especially not when Louis pulls him down into a kiss a moment later, fingers tangling into the curls at the back of his neck and laughter trembling along their lips. 

**

Apparently it is alright, Louis’ version of the song, because Harry starts adopting the change of lyrics like they were the right ones all along. The younger boy hums along with the song whenever it plays, and he belts out that changed lyric with a wide, dimpled grin every time. 

Louis usually smiles, ducks his head in attempt to hide the flustered blush that fights with his skin; Harry sings those misheard lyrics even louder. 

**

Harry doesn’t tell Louis about it ahead of time. 

He just comes back to the flat later in the evening one night, his upper arm still covered with the wrappings they put on before he left the shop. 

“Another,” is the first thing Louis says when he sees him. His eyes zero in on the bandage, covering the same spot as Harry’s single star tattoo, and he grimaces. “Christ, what did you get now? A moon to befriend the star?” 

“No,” Harry tells him. “Cute idea, though.” 

Louis rolls his eyes, arms folded tightly against his chest, and waits a moment before raising a brow. “Well? Do I at least get to know what you permanently inked yourself with this time?” 

A smile flourishes across Harry’s lips, dimple and all. “You’ll see,” he says. 

The older boy clicks his tongue and leaves the room with an exasperated sigh, saying no more. 

“I think you’re gonna like it!” Harry calls after him, unable to tame his grin even with the slight soreness that’s settled into his arm. 

“I doubt it!” Louis calls in return. 

Harry hopes to prove him wrong. 

**

He shows it to Louis later that night, just before bed. 

He removes the wrappings, letting the irritated skin breathe, and looks at the new swirl of black letters scattered along the inside of his arm. His lips peel into an easy grin, and he almost misses Louis walking into the room. 

“That it, then?” Louis asks, stopped just inside the doorway. His head’s tilted to the side, and he squints to try and get a better look of the tattoo, but Harry knows it’s not legible from that far away. 

“C’mere,” he says, beckons Louis closer with a wave of his hand. 

Louis enters the room with a step of hesitance, like he’s not entirely sure he wants to get any closer. And maybe he doesn’t; he’s always had this thing about tattoos, a wariness of sorts, but Harry’s been determined to change that. He gets closer, though, coming in far enough to sit down beside Harry on the edge of the bed. He settles in close, their knees bumping together, and leans in even closer to read the lettering. 

Harry watches as he does, doesn’t even give the inked skin another look in favor of watching Louis’ reaction, which, well, it isn’t much. The older boy’s brow contracts in concentration as he reads over the words, and it straightens out after a moment but his face stays unreadable. He stares at the tattoo much longer than it takes to read the five words, and his lips don’t scrunch up into a grimace or fall into a frown, but they also don’t twitch with the smile Harry was hoping for. 

Harry’s own smile falters after a minute too long. “You don’t like it,” he comments, gutted. He goes to pull his arm away, maybe hide it against his side or bury it beneath one of the pillows, but Louis stops him, hand curling around his elbow. 

“I never said that.” 

“You didn’t say anything,” Harry points out. 

Louis doesn’t laugh or smile or frown; he just stares at the tattoo again. It takes another minute before he states, “You got the wrong lyrics inked into your skin, Harry.” 

Harry smiles, a muted kind, and laughs out a bewildered sound. “I’m aware.” 

Louis finally looks away from Harry’s arm, meets his eyes. “Why would you get the wrong lyrics inked into your skin, Harry?” he asks, and his voice is small, like maybe he doesn’t want to know. 

The younger boy shrugs, tries to keep his smile under wraps. “Because they’re your wrong lyrics?” he explains, and it comes out more like a question than a statement. And maybe, maybe he shouldn’t have—but _no_ , he shakes his head because he’d given this thought, he had, he’d given it more than a little thought, and, “Your wrong lyrics are just as important to me as the song itself. More than, probably.” 

The quick response that Louis had seems to stop on the tip of his tongue, because he pauses, mouth ajar, and stares at Harry with a look of bewilderment. “Why?” he finally asks. 

“Because I wanted to,” comes the simplest answer, and that’s really all it is. Harry shrugs again and his fingers find Louis’ on the bedspread, falling into the empty spaces. He squeezes once. “I wanted to,” he reiterates with a stronger tone, “and I really just… I don’t want us to stop until we give it our all, Lou. I don’t want us to stop till we surrender.” _I don’t want us to ever stop._

There’s silence at first, hanging on longer than Harry would like, and he finally looks up to find Louis staring at him with a fond smile. 

“You’re an absolute idiot, Harry Styles.” 

And that, that wasn’t what Harry had expected at all. He frowns. “I am?” 

“You are,” Louis insists but tightens his fingers around Harry’s. “You’re an idiot because you got the wrong lyrics drawn onto your skin – _forever_ – and you got them there for… me.” He pauses, and then it seems to hit him like a ton of bricks—his face falls for all of a moment, falling slack, before every feature seems to turn upward with the realization: “You inked your skin for me.” 

Harry feels his cheeks heating up, feels the heat crawling all the way up his ears, but he’s too distracted by Louis’ smile to really care. “I did,” he confirms.

Laughter bubbles out of Louis, and he grins so wide it hurts. “You _inked your skin_ for _me_ ,” he says again, like it bares repeating. Harry doesn’t mind, though, when Louis says it again and again and again and even once more, stressing every word as he finally turns and presses his lips against Harry’s. He kisses Harry down all the way to the mattress, still mumbling the words, and doesn’t stop until they’re both breathless and spent. 

“You’re an idiot,” he summarizes, once they’ve both caught their breath and managed to crawl under the blankets, lights out. 

“Yeah, well.” Harry shrugs against the pillows, laughter still buzzing on his lips as he pulls Louis in a little closer. “I’ll probably be one forever, so, might as well, right?” 

Louis chuckles, chest vibrating against Harry’s side, and settles in. He nuzzles in against the younger boy’s chest, finds just the right spot for his head, and smiles as he carefully traces over the inked skin with a light touch. “I love it, you know.”

Harry smiles, despite himself, despite the darkness. “ _Good_ ,” he stresses, maybe just a little bit relieved. “I’m glad you do.” 

“And?” Louis laughs, just hot puffs of air against Harry’s skin. “What if I hated it?” 

“ _Ohhhh reckless abandon_ ,” Harry sings and draws out every word, ending it with a break of laughter. 

Louis joins in, still just a breathless sort of sound in the night, and lets his finger retrace the words, maybe a little amazed, maybe a little too touched to put into words. “Guess you lucked out, then,” is all he says after a beat. 

“Guess I did.” 

Louis smiles something soft against Harry’s chest and turns, angling just enough to meet Harry’s eyes in the dim light of the bedroom. “I really can’t believe you inked your skin for me,” he says again, probably something he’ll keep saying for days, a note of awe and a dash of delight still laced through his words. 

Harry thinks Louis’ eyes seem to twinkle like this, blue hidden in the darkness but still managing to reflect a shimmer of moonlight. It’s a pretty sight, he thinks, one he doesn’t think he’ll ever quite get used to, and the thought has his chest tightening with something sweet. “You know,” he says, fingers fanning open along Louis’ ribs, stretching across the skin, “I don’t think it’ll be the last time I ink myself for you, Lou.” 

And the smile that wins Louis’ features does nothing but to reinforce – he thinks _yeah, I’d cover myself with you if I could_ and knows for sure it won’t be the last time he chooses to carry a part of this beautiful boy with him forever. No, it’s certainly not the last time; this is just the first of many. 

And with Louis smiling up at him like that, Harry can’t think of a reason not to.


End file.
